Neighbors, Not a Few
by Atilio Montenegro
Summary: Suffering has and will always be a most effective teacher. Ozai-centric. Post War. One Shot. --"Are you a coward?"--


**Disclaimer: **Don't own AtLA or "The Animal Fair". Recreational purposes only. Respect the Vatar'd.

**Dedicated to:** This one's for Passionworks (who is the Goddess of Azula-centricness), if she'll accept responsibility for this monster. XD

**Summary:** Suffering has and will always be an effective teacher. Ozai-Centric. Post war. One shot. --"Are you a coward?"

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**"**_And now friends, if you'll gather around a little closer--_**"**

**"**_about to see here tonight the world's most ferocious monster-- captured at deadly peril of life and limb-- _**" **

**--Robert Bloch**

**----**

**Neighbors, Not A Few**

"Time to act."

Former Phoenix King Ozai paused in his whispered instructions to heed the loud movements beyond his cell. He cocked an ear. Yes, he'd heard right, the pattering of a single pair of heavy steps. His lips pulled into an anxious smirk. Only one guard tonight.

_The first mistake. _

The stale air quivered with excitement. "Patience." He scolded, his features sharpened in reprehension before slipping into as expressionless a mask as he could manage in his exultation. The battering of a heavy metal door echoed down the hallway. The serving of evening meals. It would be his turn next.

"Shh!" He rasped when the panting of expectation grew too sonorous. "We must time this perfectly."

The steps paused outside his door, keys fumbled at the entry, Ozai had to restrain his tongue from licking out at his dry lips. The lock backslid in screechingly jerky ticks, Ozai was alarmed by a pounding that challenged the too loud metallic percussion. A hurried shift of narrowed bloodshot eyes revealed no immediate threat. No. Untrue. There were a thousand dangers in attempting to escape the Boiling Rock, and he'd do well to remember it. But his misgivings proved baseless, it was only the beat of his heart.

A strong arm launched the door ajar, a light expanded from the palm of a burly hand, momentarily blinding Ozai. Cursing his weak eyes for blinking, he held them pinioned apart by sheer will. Ozai was instantly awed by the twisting flame, a buzz of curiosity tried to sift its way into him. Ozai shrugged it off, it would not interfere in his schemes, his hours of plotting. He must stay focused. He wasn't going to waste his chance.

It was the weaker of the two guards assigned to him.

_The second mistake._

The guard squinted in cursory observation of the cell, sparing only a few moments to comb over the dark expanse in which the prisoner sat. Sneering at the only _threat_, the guard stowed his flame in a grizzled lantern secured to the wall of the cell.

The accustomary tray laden with hard bread and a hollowed out wooden cup of warm acrid water was slid across the floor from where he stood to the former king's knees, crashing against his stained shift. This guard always found pleasure in his little show of power. _The fool. Mock me in my lameness. You will fry._

Ozai's palms tightened, he kept his face carefully neutral, the pounding thud continued, Ozai hoped the guard wouldn't hear it and grow suspicious. The guard shook his thickset head in amusement, turning his attention to collecting the mess from the previous day. Sometimes, when in a particularly cheered mood he'd splatter this at Ozai as well. He took a rag and set to work, not even bothering to look in the prisoner's direction. _Good. Gods, that's good! His overconfidence will be his downfall. _

"Ready?" Ozai whispered faintly, inaudible to those unaquainted with seclusion.

Silence. In the far corner of the cell the guard sloped, murmuring in disgust.

"I have my doubts, you say?"

The silence of impartial confirmation. Ozai's brow twitched.

"Well _I _do not. Now. Do it." No action whatsoever occured.

_Now we come to a predicament. _Ozai's heart jumped to his throat almost choking him, he swallowed it down hard.

"Now. Strike him down." Ozai muttered to his left, though his head swiveled to the right. "Are you a coward?"

Strained silence.

The guard was nearing the end of his chore. Ozai frowned, the thudding in his chest grew deafening. It was painful. His heartbeat craved action, and yet no one was _moving_.

"Now. Now! Bring him down NOW!"

The guard turned to face the hoary rasps in alarm, a firmly vacant stare planted across his hard features. He was vulnerable. _The third mistake._ Now. The time is now.

No one moved.

"I'll do it myself you pathetic--" Ozai snarled, furiously leaping out at the guard, but no, something caught him, held him. Ozai choked in disbelief, falling back against the rocky wall. How could he have forgotten in all the plans he'd made, in all the waking and half sleeping hours he'd spent envisioning this glorious moment? How could he have forgotten the chains that held him?

"You talking to _me_, filth?"

Ozai could only stare down at his chained wrists, taking in how hopelessly fast his ambitions were. He shook them once, a clanging echo, but it went well with the sound of his pulse. Mad? _You_ _presumptuous ass. _More than mad, enraged. Madness could not begin to describe the turbulence surging, embedding into the darker recesses of the former king's mind.

The guard shoved a palm to the prisoners forehead. Ozai's head met stone, his face washed with the rag of his own foulness until he could no longer see the guard's teeth protruding, beast-like, in a grotesque sneer, his glassy meaningless eyes glossed over with contempt. Ozai's neck swung and nodded in distress until the guard pulled back, satisfied.

"Fear not _Lord_, you may be cracked, but I'll be sure to always remind you of your place." The guard laughed at Ozai's sputtering, exiting with a bumptious swagger, he called the precious flame to him, leaving the cell pitch-black. "Lights out."

Ozai traced the retreating footfalls and ribald braying in the fold of an ear, until once more, only his tolling heart held dominion over his sensations. His chest swelled and fell, exhaling the putrid air. He shook himself. The darkness set in. This time there was no elaborate proposal to writhe to perfection. It was just himself and another failure.

The prisoner lashed a fist to the side of him. His knuckles made contact with rock. It was unexpected. He pulled his hand to his chest cradling his weakness, the hollow pain reverberated throughout his body. He thrust it from him. He was supposed to _conflict_ this pain, not be on the receiving end of it. Why had _he_ been hurt?

There was something, a nagging. What was it? He pulled at the chains again.

_No. That's not_ _it. _The obnoxiously ticking heart again hitched to his throat, the prisoner swiftly fumbled his hands to either side of himself in the darkness, as far as he could reach. Gripping at intangible forms, dragging his nails across the dirty stone floor. Cold, hard, _mesmeric_ realization.

"Oh, yes, now I see." There was no one here but himself. No one to blame this failure on.

_No. No...there is someone..._

Ozai shook his head vehemently, his long matted hair slapped against his pale forehead. "No. Not weak. No." He clawed his dirt-caked nails down his face. His eyes flashed, he tried to follow the streaks of color dancing in the darkness, little specks of unfamiliar constellations. Anything to take hold of.

_You used to be the source of my greatest pride._

Ozai's heart beat faster, until his head felt hideously bloated. He hated the sound, his only company, it pestered him, keeping him awake, hammering at him, trying to break him against anvil, always palpable, always near, right inside of him.

Brittle arms plodded against his chest. How inaccessible! If only he could sink his hands into it, he would--

"No, no, calm. Let me be calm. That is not the way. That way is madness."

_And you are not mad?_

The darkness swept in and Ozai almost disappeared over the edge. He shook himself free, grasping the rock behind him in fear. No. Madness, never. He remembers, he can recall so many things. He knows he ruled the greatest empire in the world. He remembers when a child left him with no flame to extinguish the night. He remembers-- _Why you are alone_ _here?_

The question is decisive, and should not have gone unweighed. It sends his throbbing mind counter-swirling in a crowning agony. _You drove them all off didn't you?_

"They betrayed me."

_Yes, and yet they came. They came to give you a choice, and like the fool_ _you are--_

"Such marvelous council!" Ozai held his head between his palms threateningly. "I'm tired of it."

_Listen boy. Simply listen to yourself._

"Silence!" Ozai hissed out angrily to the darkness, jerking his head to one side, "If you'd shut up for once!"

There was quiet. A halcyon amidst the maelstrom of unhinging thoughts. The only noises heard were the pulsing ripples in his ears, cupped tightly between his hands. The beating picked up in tempo.

"I hear...is this...revelation?"

No answer, save his own heartbeat. Yes. There is something about the rhythm telling him...something. With the enthusiastic fervor that may posess a mad man, Ozai threw all his weight forward until he was leaning out into the darkness, his arms pulled taut behind him, held fast, he centered all his senses on the noise. He felt sure it was condensing. What would he hear that he hadn't heard before, a million times over? Something important? He stopped taking in air, wrenching, straining, all his thought bent on the pulse. A procession of abrupt rigid claps. It echoed through the cell, rolling off the massive slabs of rock. Ozai cocked his ear. Grave. A moaning drumroll. Death?

_No._

Ozai doubled his focus on the palpitations. His veins throbbed against the cuffs of his shackles. Pitter-pattering. A rain shower. Redemption?

"No." Ozai growled furiously, his brow creased in frustration. He grew impatient and began clicking his tongue to the beats, amplifying the cryptic cadence. His body grew pained from not supplying his lungs. His mind seemed to cloud, as his heart skipped. In it's frenzy the rhythm split, pulled into two loose ends, unraveling, Ozai fought to retain consciousness, struggling to localize the clinking, to find it's meaning. He could hold out.

He would.

He was _not_ weak.

Not...

_... weak. No use._

Ozai gulped in a breath of treacherous air, his concentration broken, he crashed to his knees in exhausted defeat.

_You betrayed yourself._

Former Phoenix King Ozai crashed forward, burying his face in the dust floor, he sobbed openly, rocking wildly, the shame of his failure wracked his body. His mind, whatever was left of it to begin with, left him in that moment. If only it had held out a little longer, if he hadn't broken down so completely, or maybe if he'd just heeded his _own_ words to begin with, perhaps he would have discerned his heartbeat crescendo into thunderous applause.

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A/N: Yuppers.

Due to a regrettable amount of 'deep female consideration' if you have anything to add go right ahead, I won't hold it against you. XD

_I don't mean to abuse the Melon Lord in his lameness, it just kinda happens. B)_


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